Virtual Insanity
"Virtual Insanity" is a song by British funk and acid jazz band Jamiroquai, released on 19 August 1996 as the second single from their third studio album, Travelling Without Moving (1996). The song interpolates parts of Jocelyn Brown's post-disco hit "Somebody Else's Guy" (1984), and its award-winning music video was released in September 1996, garnering ten nominations and winning four, including for "Video of the Year", at the 1997 MTV Video Music Awards.
"Virtual Insanity"
- "Do You Know Where You're Coming From"
- "Bullet"
19 August 1996
- 5:40 (album version)
- 4:04 (single version)
- 3:46 (radio edit)
Al Stone
"Virtual Insanity" was a number-one hit in Iceland and reached number three on the UK Singles Chart. As well as becoming a top ten hit in Finland, Ireland, and Italy, the song also climbed to number 38 on the US Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart upon the single's release in the United States in 1997. The song also earned the band a Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group.[1]
Composition[edit]
The song's lyrics took inspiration from a walk in an underground city in Sendai, Japan, by singer Jay Kay and the band's digeridoo player, Wallis Buchanan, with Kay writing:[2] "Everything was covered in snow and there was absolutely no one about. [We took] these stairs that led down to this whole underground city … with all the color and noise you get in Japanese streets."[3] The song's title is a play off virtual reality.[4]
Initially recorded as a rough demo, it was only after the label requested a single for Travelling Without Moving that the song was fully realised and was the last track to be properly recorded.[5] The song has a piano opening with "buoyant keyboards and soaring strings."[6][7] The riff continues throughout the song.
Thematically, the lyrics are concerned with issues like overpopulation, human genetic enhancement, eugenics, and ecological collapse.
The first B-side of the single is the song "Do U Know Where You're Coming From", in collaboration with M-Beat. It was released as a single earlier in 1996. The second B-side of the single is "Bullet".
In the beginning of the song's album version, a sound that is sampled from the 1979 sci-fi horror film Alien appears. It is the sound sequence when the S.O.S. signal appears on the screens of the spaceship Nostromo at the start of the film.[8] The album version is longer, including the addition of extra vocals and a bridge.
Critical reception[edit]
The song received favourable reviews from music critics. Scottish newspaper Aberdeen Press and Journal viewed it as "cool if lyrically trite".[9] Justin Chadwick from Albumism wrote that the "midtempo, piano-driven groove" finds the singer "lamenting the proliferation of technology at the expense of human connection and preservation of our planet", as best evidenced in the chorus with lines such as, "Always seem to, be governed by this love we have / For useless, twisting, our new technology / Oh, now there is no sound—for we all live underground". He added, "While the song itself reflected Jamiroquai's more mature and polished sound at the time, it was the accompanying video unveiled the following month that became the band's transformative, watershed moment."[10] Larry Flick from Billboard described it as "wriggling" and "funk-fortified".[11] A reviewer from Liverpool Echo noted, "If you stop dancing, and listen to the lyrics, you see a whole new side to singer Jay Kay."[12] Music Week rated it four out of five, writing: "From its simple piano opening onwards, this gorgeous, immaculately-recorded track doesn't put a note wrong. Further evidence that Jay Kay is maturing musically."[13] Ted Kessler from NME declared it as a "bittersweet" gem and a "fine" single.[14] Sam Taylor from The Observer remarked its "effortless swank".[15] Aidin Viziri from Salon said the singer "keeps the party alive with unbridled enthusiasm", "exploring the chaos of modern life".[16]